A Hostage Negotiator teams up with a Sharpshooter to bring down a dangerous jewel thief.A Hostage Negotiator teams up with a Sharpshooter to bring down a dangerous jewel thief.A Hostage Negotiator teams up with a Sharpshooter to bring down a dangerous jewel thief.
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Featured reviews
Metro, starring Eddie Murphy, may well be worth your viewing time. Yes it got a fair amount of negative reviews from people who wanted to see another "Nutty Professor" or thought of "Metro" as Murphy trying to play Axel Foley again. Others had problems with the script, the plot, the pace of the film, but nobody cared to mention how good Murphy actually is in this. His character is a San Francisco hostage negotiator, named Scott Roper, who one day meets his worst enemy in a jewel thief (played wonderfully by Michael Wincott) who makes his job a nightmare. From that point on a cat & mouse chase between Murphy & Wincott develops, & plays it's part in a rather amusing way. I don't want to give a lecture here on this subject, because movies like "Metro" are just made to entertain the viewer. "Metro" is a solid action film, with some suspense, some great stunts, and very good performances from the whole cast. Murphy, in what I think is one of his better roles, gives us his comedic touch, but this is more of a dramatic, serious role for him. I saw not Murphy, but Scott Roper, throughout the whole movie. A sure sign that an actor is doing his job quite well! - Murphy is superb.
If you rent this movie thinking it is another Eddie Murphy action-comedy, you better think again!!!! This movie is STRICTLY an action flick. Of course, that's not a complaint, it's just a statement. Murphy still is enjoyable as the hero. He's not playing Axel Foley from the BEVERLY HILLS COP movies, but he sure seems a lot like him. It also steals elements from some of his earlier films. In my opinion, this is a guy movie. The women will probally be bored by the non-stop action and the fact that the only woman in the movie is Eddie Murphy's girlfriend, but action fans will LOVE this movie!!!
Fast talking police negotiator Scott Roper foils a bank robbery and catches the head thief. When the thief, Korda, escapes from jail, he comes after Roper. Roper meanwhile is trying to juggle his job, his girlfriend and train a sniper to become a negotiator like him.
This film was made before Nutty Porfessor but was held back because the makers realesed it was a bit of a dog by itself and decided to wait till Nutty Professor had made Murphy hot again before riding on that wave. Sadly I was one of those fooled into thinking that the hot new Murphy had made a cool cop thriller. Rather this is a by the numbers affair that has plenty of cliches and very little spark to it.
What spark there is, is added by Murphy's motor mouth performance he is funny and lively even when the film isn't. Rapaport is also good despite everything else and British born Ejogo is good as Murphy's girlfriend. Wincott's villain is right out of a catalogue and is typical of the film's lack of initiative or spark.
Overall, like most average cop thrillers it's worth a watch once because it is just about entertaining. The problem is it is plain average. It never rises above the norm and there are much better cop thrillers out there than this. The producers and studio knew it who am I to argue.
This film was made before Nutty Porfessor but was held back because the makers realesed it was a bit of a dog by itself and decided to wait till Nutty Professor had made Murphy hot again before riding on that wave. Sadly I was one of those fooled into thinking that the hot new Murphy had made a cool cop thriller. Rather this is a by the numbers affair that has plenty of cliches and very little spark to it.
What spark there is, is added by Murphy's motor mouth performance he is funny and lively even when the film isn't. Rapaport is also good despite everything else and British born Ejogo is good as Murphy's girlfriend. Wincott's villain is right out of a catalogue and is typical of the film's lack of initiative or spark.
Overall, like most average cop thrillers it's worth a watch once because it is just about entertaining. The problem is it is plain average. It never rises above the norm and there are much better cop thrillers out there than this. The producers and studio knew it who am I to argue.
Eddie Murphy as a foul-mouthed, loud-mouthed action lead? I'm in. True, the man has done little worth one's time past the 80's, but he's fun to watch with only a few exceptions. The plot and writing in general is cliché-ridden... the best way to enjoy the film is really to avoid thinking about it, and just going with it. The action scenes are fairly well-done, and the cinematography is decent enough. Whether or not you enjoy the frequent jokes appearing early on regarding one particular characters identity is difficult to say... personally, I found them to be somewhat cute. The humor in general is fair. The dialog is okay, but not terribly memorable. The plot progression is good enough. The action isn't breaking any new ground, but it manages to be exciting and intense, and fairly well-edited, as well. The finale is quite good, very good tension. The acting is good... Rapaport and Murphy work well together, and Wincott makes a good villain(as Alien: Resurrection will tell you, he makes an awesome bad guy, criminal type). The romantic interest of Murphy works well... they've got good on-screen chemistry, and their scenes together are credible. In conclusion; sure, we've seen all this before... but it's still good for a fun two hours. I recommend this to big fans of action films and/or Eddie Murphy. 6/10
Scott Roper is a wise cracking hostage negotiator, he is however exceptionally good at his job. After bringing down a particularly nasty bank robber called Michael Korda, he sets about winning his old girlfriend back whilst breaking in a new partner, Kevin McCall. When Korda escapes from prison there is only one thing on his mind, revenge, can Roper outwit Korda once again? And if so, at what cost?
There has always seemed to me to be something of a negative bias towards post 1980s Eddie Murphy (Roper) films, it appears that no matter what, nothing that comes close to his best 80s efforts will ever be deemed worthy. Now I'm not saying that Metro is a world beater, or even close to Beverly Hills Cop and Trading Places, but it's an accomplished thriller with classy bits of Murphy humour thrown in. It also boasts splendid support from Michael Rapaport as Roper's intelligent partner McCall, both men playing off each other to good effect, while Michael Wincott with his gravel voice used to full effect, is impressively devilish as the bad guy of the piece. Let down by a weak female lead in Carmen Ejogo, and certainly the familiarity of the genre loses the film any real sense of impending dread, but for a quick fix of nonsense entertainment on a blustery cold night, it's a more than OK viewing. 6/10
There has always seemed to me to be something of a negative bias towards post 1980s Eddie Murphy (Roper) films, it appears that no matter what, nothing that comes close to his best 80s efforts will ever be deemed worthy. Now I'm not saying that Metro is a world beater, or even close to Beverly Hills Cop and Trading Places, but it's an accomplished thriller with classy bits of Murphy humour thrown in. It also boasts splendid support from Michael Rapaport as Roper's intelligent partner McCall, both men playing off each other to good effect, while Michael Wincott with his gravel voice used to full effect, is impressively devilish as the bad guy of the piece. Let down by a weak female lead in Carmen Ejogo, and certainly the familiarity of the genre loses the film any real sense of impending dread, but for a quick fix of nonsense entertainment on a blustery cold night, it's a more than OK viewing. 6/10
Did you know
- TriviaOne of the reasons why Eddie Murphy choose to star in Metro is because he wanted to play a dramatic role in a more serious action picture than his previous films were. Even before he accepted the role in Metro, around early 1995 he was originally going to star in another action thriller titled Sandblast. The script for the film was written by screenwriter Steven Maeda in 1993 and he sold it to Joel Silver, famous producer of many action hits, and Warner Bros. for $750,000.
Described as both Die Hard and Cliffhanger in a desert sandstorm, the plot of Sandblast would have been very similar to the plot of John Woo's Broken Arrow (1996). It was to take place in the Iraq desert after the Gulf War, and Murphy would play the lead role of an ex-landmine expert and army specialist who has to help a group of US commandos stop a team of traitorous Green Berets from tracking down lost nuclear warheads which are somewhere in the desert wasteland, and while dealing with a huge sandstorm at the same time.
Once Murphy quit the project due to scheduling conflicts and then went on to star in Metro, Wesley Snipes was hired to play the main role and there were plans to hire Jean Claude Van Damme to play the main villain, but since Snipes' latest films weren't a success and Van Damme didn't want to play the villain, Warner Bros. cancelled the project in 1996 and it was never made.
- GoofsWhen Scott tells his superior that Kevin won't last two weeks his head is turned away from Kevin so there's no way that Kevin could have read his lips and known that he said that.
- Quotes
[training McCall as a hostage negotiator]
Kevin McCall: I'm Officer McCall, I'm unarmed, just want to make sure everybody gets out of her safely.
Scott Roper: Okay, stop right there. Close your eyes.
Kevin McCall: Okay.
Scott Roper: Now tell me what you see.
Kevin McCall: [keeping his eyes closed] I see a scumbag behind the counter with a sawed-off, nine-millimeter tucked away in his waistband. There's a female hostage down in front of the cereal rack with a red polka-dot dress. Another hostage three feet to her right, with blue jeans and a checkered shirt. A male hostage down, green shirt, white pants, in front of the candy rack. There's a female scumbag behind me with a gun tucked away in her shirt, trying to pass herself off as a hostage. And there's a special on toilet paper, four for $1.29. That's a lot of toilet paper. Am I right?
Scott Roper: That's pretty good, you got good eyes.
Kevin McCall: You like that?
Scott Roper: Very impressive.
- ConnectionsEdited into Epicenter (2000)
- SoundtracksYou Don't Have to Worry
Written by Sean 'Diddy' Combs (as Sean "Puffy" Combs), Chucky Thompson, Heavy D, Quinnes Dammond Parker (as Quinnes Parker), DaRon Jones, Slim (as Marvin Sandrick), Michael Marcel Keith (as Michael Keith) and Jadakiss (as Jason Phillips)
Performed by New Edition
Courtesy of MCA Records
By arrangement with Universal Music Special Markets
- How long is Metro?Powered by Alexa
Details
Box office
- Budget
- $55,000,000 (estimated)
- Gross US & Canada
- $32,000,301
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $11,411,107
- Jan 20, 1997
- Gross worldwide
- $32,000,301
- Runtime
- 1h 57m(117 min)
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 2.35 : 1
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